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Robert Nickelsberg’s Afghanistan

September 1996

In this picture, Talban soldiers fire a rocket at retreating forces of the Northern Alliance army north of Kabul. In those days, says Nickelsberg, Taliban members generally didn’t mind getting photographed. “Though you had to be careful about how far you thought you could go. You never knew where their leaders were.”

Around the time this picture was taken, Nickelsberg was once again with Taliban soldiers north of Kabul when a clerical leader arrived to inspect the front line. Although the soldiers hadn’t cared much, the mullah was not happy to see an American photojournalist there. "After he ordered us to leave, and as I approached our car, he picked up a rock the size of a watermelon and threw it at my head.”

The capital fell to the Taliban on Sept. 27, 1996. The Kabul government’s defenses collapsed with little resistance to the Taliban advance.